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Re: [microsound] MAP Series Guest Lecture: Ian Andrews
Hi Ian,
eventually managed to read your article. It helped to sort a few things
out, but after while even more questions formed themselves.
Sorry, if I just rave on:
Is the aesthetic of the glitch, the modulations, the 'errors' of the
material processes really a return to pure art? Is it not rather an attempt
to reach the 'real' (forever unreachable according to Lacan) in the slips
and folds of illusionary reality (reality as a social and imaginative
construction; the glitch as an eruption of the real, the non-human,
non-intentional). The use of aleatoric elements as a device to invite the
"real" in? In that view, "the real" would be everything beyond human
intention and conception. Clicks&Glitch aesthetics might be an attempt to
see computers, the digital as "nature," their productions as something
partially escaping human conscious intention, nudging "chance" in. Somehow
our conception of the "Real" (as opposed to reality) includes "chance" --
in the sense of an order that is beyond human conception, appearing thus
more real (maybe because it disrupts our expectations). The modern and
postmodern condition seems to be unable to reach the "Real" unless it
disrupts reality as the unknown, inexpected, unforeseeable.
Thus I am not sure whether this is exclusively a terrain of aesthetics;
seems to be there is some kind of ontology, if not cosmology behind it. If
the cosmos is noise, then music in the classical western sense is a filter
of that noise, just as our colours are filtered white light. If the
'errors' bring in an element of chaos, an element of noise, there is the
hope that by courting error and chance we can trick out the filters or
shift them or whatever. Since we can't aspire to experience the original
white light, nor the real cosmic noise, we beseech them to enter our
compositions through the backdoor. If the computer is our mirror (in the
narcissistic sense of being our product thus reflecting our wishes and
designs) we try to tinker with this mirror in order to get reflections not
of ourselves but of what may lie behind our backs ... (wrong metaphor
somehow, too much fixed on the eye.)
[Maybe this is a very feminine perspective, conflating the Real with the
material. But I simply can't see matter as anything else but spirit on a
low level of vibration. Thus attempts to exclude the Real are acts of
cowardice, controlmania or ego-inflation. O my, a manifesto?]
I don't see the 'aesthetics' of noise and errors as an attempt of
representation; there is often the ironic element, the element of
self-reflection of the medium etc. But what I find really interesting is
the music of noise as a creation process in its own right, not
re-presenting something but allowing that something to present itself as
the process of its own emergence. When noise condenses to structures (or
when structures are filtered out of noise) the emergence of order parallels
the creation of everything there is. On the other hand when 'errors' are
foregrounded, this outcry of the medium somehow introduces the "Real," the
chaotic which is the conditio sine qua non of emergence -- I don't know,
sounds almost like negative theology, or as if the "sublime" is imbedded in
the seams of reality.
As much as I like Erik Davis's book Techgnosis I would take another stance:
maybe the digital aspires to a state of pure spirit -- but hell, give me
errors, give me something Real... I can't see in what sense this would be
"pure art".
Merely some ramblings triggered by your article.
Yours,
Dagmar
Ian Andrews wrote:
> A very rough version of this talk is now up at
> http://radioscopia.org/postdig.html
>
> On Monday, November 4, 2002, at 06:11 PM, shannon o'neill wrote:
>
> > MAP SERIES PRESENTS A GUEST LECTURE BY
> >
> > IAN ANDREWS
> >
> > on
> >
> > POST-DIGITAL AESTHETICS
> >
> > What are the characteristics of a post-digital aesthetics?
> > This presentation looks at issues concerning process, originality,
> > aura, error, neo-minimalism, conceptualism and performance
> > in relation to recent music, sound, video and online art.
> >
> > Ian Andrews is a video, film and electronic music/sound artist.
> > His work has been exhibited inter/nationally. He is currently
> > working on digital video and net based sound projects.
> > http://radioscopia.org
> >
> > 5.30-6.30pm
> > Wednesday, November 6
> > Lecture Theatre 3.510
> > Bon Marche Building
> > Harris St, Broadway
> > University of Technology Sydney
> >
> > FREE - All welcome!
> >
> > MAP Series is presented by Media Arts and Production
> > at UTS, and is coordinated by Shannon O'Neill. It features
> > artists working across sound, video and new media.
> >
> > For more info mailto:Shannon.ONeill@xxxxxxxxxx
> >
> > --
> > shannon o'neill
> > lecturer, media arts and production
> > faculty of humanities and social sciences
> > university of technology sydney (uts)
> >
> >
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> >
> >
>
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